Forbes Top Influencers: These 10 Tech And Business Experts Rule Social Media

Gary Vaynerchuk realized the power of online influence years before many of today's YouTube stars were even born. The serial entrepreneur, who moved to the U.S. from the former USSR as a toddler, was one of the internet's earliest adopters of social media as a tool to build a lucrative following.

In the 1990s, he took his family's wine business online, then launched a daily webcast in 2006 and a digital agency -- cofounded with his brother -- in 2009. Today, he's an investor (including in social platforms like Facebook and Twitter) as well as hosting a YouTube docu-series and a podcast, among many other ventures.

He's joined by much-followed digital stars like Marques Brownlee, who got his start online at the age of 16, making screencasts and software tutorials. Today, the 24-year-old can command millions of views on his tech- and gadget-focused YouTube channel; an iPhone 7 unboxing video in 2016 has racked up 9.9 million views. He's worked with brands including Google, Apple, YouTube, Tesla, and Nike.

Other list members include Justine Ezarik, perhaps the original tech influencer, best known as 'iJustine' online. She made her first website in 1996, having taught herself HTML at age 12. Ezarik started blogging about her love of Apple products in college, creating video content as early as 2002. By 2009, Fast Company named her one of the 50 most influential women in tech. She published her memoir, 'I, Justine,' in 2015.

For this list, Forbes partnered with influencer analytics firm Traackr, using its proprietary data to measure reach, or audience size; resonance, or propensity for virality; and relevance, or engagement related to their area of expertise.

With the help of social insight platform Captiv8, we weighted each candidate’s potential for earnings per post according to the size of their following. Captiv8 also provided demographic snapshots of each influencer’s audience.

“Influence is not a measure of follower size, but rather of authenticity," said Influential CEO Ryan Detert. "These influencers are the leaders of their space because they are demographically, contextually, and psychographically relevant to their audiences."

Forbes reviewed each candidate’s endorsements and other businesses generated offline, like product lines and book deals.

Only influencers who made it big by building their fame from the internet up were included, rather than celebrities who also happen to have large audiences online. That’s why you don’t see, for instance, Microsoft billionaire Bill Gates on this ranking. While he and his team have built an enviable following in the multi-millions across social platforms, he was a mega-successful business figure well before the founders of Facebook and Twitter were a twinkle in their parents' eyes.

Forbes limited its scope to influencers who mostly post in English. Social audience data for this second list is accurate as of November 2017.